All posts by Common Sense Canadian

Audio: Damien Gillis on ‘Multi-Issue Extremism’, Liberal Gas Agenda

Canada, Politics
Share

Listen to Damien Gillis and Nanaimo’s CHLY host Rae Kornberger discuss how activism is becoming “extremism” – even terrorism – under the Harper Government’s petro-state regime. Invoking new, secretive anti-terrorism laws, federal agencies including CSIS and the RCMP are being directed to infiltrate, spy on and harass “multi-issue extremists”, whom they define as “activist groups, indigenous groups, environmentalists and others who are publicly critical of government policy.” The pair also cover the Christy Clark Government’s bold – and Gillis suggests foolish – vision to turn BC into a Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) superpower. (from June 26, 2013)

 

Share

Morton: Salmon Virus Lab Stripped of World Body Certification

Fisheries, Oceans
Share

Republished from Alexandra Morton’s blog.

The World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), our global first line of defence against farm animal epidemics, just stacked the odds against stopping ISA virus from spreading in British Columbia. They stripped the lab I am using to track ISA virus of its international certification.

Farm animal epidemics are considered one of the greatest threats to human food security and health. The OIE expects member countries to report diseases of global significance. One of these “reportable” diseases is the influenza family Infectious Salmon Anemia virus, ISAv.

The OIE designates “reference” labs for each reportable disease. Being a reference lab is a perilous responsibility, because calling a new region “positive” for a reportable virus will cause economic hardship to large, powerful agri-businesses. They don’t like that. We, the public, depend on these labs to stand up to this pressure and not take the easier course of action.

I became concerned ISA virus could be spreading into the North Pacific from the Atlantic salmon feedlots when I read the BC government’s many reports of the “classic lesions associated with ISA virus infection” in the Atlantic salmon being reared in BC.

A small team of us have now sampled farm salmon from supermarkets across Canada and wild salmon throughout BC and I sent them to the closest ISA virus reference lab, Dr. Kibenge’s lab at the Atlantic Veterinary College. This was the lab that diagnosed ISA virus in Chile, just before the virus went epidemic causing $2 billion in damages. No one in Chile recognized they had ISA until Kibenge diagnosed it, but by then it was too late. The virus had come from Norway in farm salmon eggs and raged through the country killing salmon.

British Columbia is currently rated as an ISA-free region by the OIE and this brings considerable value to the BC farm salmon product. The USA has stated they do not want ISA virus contaminated salmon, so being ISA-free is critical to accessing the enormous US market, to the survival of the Norwegian salmon feedlot industry using BC to grow its fish.

The CFIA testified at the federal Cohen Commission into the collapse of the Fraser sockeye salmon that if ISA virus is “confirmed” BC farm salmon trade will grind to a halt (see film above). These are big agribusinesses with Norway heavily invested.

The Kibenge lab found pieces of RNA sequence, in my samples. When virologists detect sequences of RNA, they run them through databases that look for matches, like police run fingerprints. These RNA sequences matched European ISA virus, known to infect Atlantic salmon.

Canada refuses to accept these matches as “confirmation” of the ISA virus, because they are only pieces of the virus. Canada does not even see these results as “suspect” for ISA virus. Canada requires the entire viral sequence or “virus isolation,” before reporting to the OIE. However, no one has found the whole ISA virus in salmon which are simply carriers of the virus. The fish has to be dying of the virus for “virus isolation” to be successful. To get a fresh dying Atlantic salmon, you have to have access to salmon in the farm.

This rule sets the bar so high, it prevents any kind of an early warning. It means the virus can be seeping out of the feedlots into the wild and no response is required. No lab studying ISA virus has ever faced the kind of samples I sent to the Kibenge lab, because nobody has ever gone looking for ISA BEFORE it goes epidemic. Most ISA virus researchers have access to dying farm salmon, we only have access to farm salmon in supermarkets. I have been highly criticized for testing the farm salmon in markets – but this is the only way I could ground-truth the BC vet’s reporting that farm salmon in BC only look like they ISA virus, but not to worry that the virus is not actually present.

Seven labs other labs testified at the Cohen Commission that they too found ISA virus sequence, but they have all gone silent since they were questioned under oath. Kibenge’s lab is the only independent lab in Canada running samples provided by an independent biologist.

In November, 2012, the CFIA recommended to the OIE that the Kibenge lab lose its “reference lab” status.

In June, 2013, the OIE removed their reference lab status from the Kibenge lab.

A few days later the CFIA announced they could not find ISA virus in 4,175 wild salmon in BC using “virus isolation.” This test has never worked on wild salmon, everyone involved knows this and the CFIA refuses to test the Atlantic farm salmon, for this Atlantic virus.

I wrote to the Director General of the OIE to ask why they abandoned the Kibenge lab, but he won’t say.

In 2010, China closed its border to Canadian pork during the H1N1 influenza outbreak. In a strange government press release, Canada reopened the pork border to China through successful negotiation of “supplementary certification requirements,” from the OIE and immediately following this Canada gave the OIE $2 million. “The OIE has played a central role in developing international consensus that recognizes Canada’s effective measures to deal with BSE, H1N1, and avian influenza.” Download Canada OIE.png (406.5K)

To remove the “reference lab” status 178 OIE delegates had to vote – international consensus – decided the one lab free to work on ISA virus in BC should lose its credibility. Note all the delegates appear to be government bureaucrats.

Each time the Kibenge Lab gets an ISA virus positive result, the CFIA takes the sample away from the lab with the understanding that they were retesting it. There have been many headlines to this affect.

In April 2012, the OIE wrote me saying the CFIA was investigating the Kibenge Lab positive results:

The OIE is aware that the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) has been investigating reports of ISAV in wild salmon in British Columbia[My samples sent to Kibenge’s lab]. I am informed that testing of samples by the CFIA national reference laboratory for the national aquatic animal health programme, using the methods recommended in the OIE Manual of Diagnostic Tests for Aquatic Animals, were negative.Download OIE Reply_ISA_Ms Morton.pdf (474.2K)

So apparently the OIE thought the CFIA was investigating the BC ISA virus positive results by retesting them using approved methods. The CFIA said they were going to “send the samples for testing…”

On November 5, 2012, the CFIA talks about “disparate and non-repeatable results” from the Kibenge lab and recommends stripping the lab of its status.

On March 11, 2013 I ask the CFIA about their follow-up testing and the CFIA responded they are not doing any follow-up testing on my samples at all!

So to confirm, we are not doing any diagnostic testing and will not be doing any diagnostic testing for ISA whatsoever. No PCR testing, no virus isolation, no further diagnostic testing because such testing will be of no value to the CFIA at this time. (email, Gary Kruger, CFIA, March 22, 2013).

Shortly after writing this, Gary Kruger’s CFIA email started bouncing.

A few days after the OIE removed its authority and protection from the Kibenge lab the CFIA announced they sampled 4,175 wild salmon and could not find ISA virus. They used “virus isolation,” on wild salmon, a test that has never been demonstrated to work, and did not test any of the millions of Atlantic salmon in net pens in BC waters for this Atlantic virus. This means, the virus could be the farms and entering wild salmon and it will never be detected by the CFIA, even though fragments of the virus have been found in wild salmon by seven labs, most of them working for the Canadian Fisheries and Oceans.

An internal CFIA email produced by the Cohen Commission discussed winning the ISA public relations “war”? Download won the war DFO-599910[1] copy.pdf (199.8K)

“One battle is won, now we have to nail the surveillance piece, and we will win the war, also.” (email Nov. 9. 2011, Joseph Beres CFIA).

Well, the CFIA did indeed “nail the surveillance piece.” They are using a test that has never worked on wild salmon. They are winning this “war”, by using a test that has never worked on wild salmon, they won’t retest the positive results by a leading lab and they won’t test the Atlantic salmon for this Atlantic virus. When I ask too many questions, emails start returning undelivered.

In response, to the OIE decertification of Dr. Kibenge’s lab several First Nations have written to the CFIA and the OIE stating they have samples of fish they have rights and title to in Dr. Kibenge’s lab and they expect the ISA virus testing to be carried out uninterrupted. Many First Nation fishermen worked with me to allow me to sample their catches these samples of Fraser River salmon are in Dr. Kibenge’s lab.

I am going to make a prediction here, based on current trends. The work I am doing with Dr. Kibenge is going to be shut down and only the CFIA will be allowed to report on ISA virus in BC. ISA virus will be successfully denied for some period of time and then there will be outbreaks, like Newfoundland and Nova Scotia are facing right now and we the public will pay to clean it up, we will have to reimburse the farmers if they are ordered to cull their diseased fish, we will eat these diseased fish as they will be sold in the markets and we will live the great experiment on impact of a ferocious Atlantic salmon virus on Pacific wild salmon. The companies will be covered and the price of farm salmon will go up in Chile, if all their BC farm salmon die. It’s a win win for them, loose, loose for the rest of us.

Before my work with the Kibenge lab, look at how Fisheries and Ocean Canada handled ISA virus positive test results in 100% of the most endangered Fraser River sockeye stock, the Cultus Lake sockeye. They hid them from the Cohen Commission, with absolutely no consequence to that lab. The Simon Jones/Garth Traxler lab have their names on a draft report on ISA virus detection in BC’s most endangered wild sockeye, a stock of salmon that caused entire fisheries closures at enormous losses to British Columbians, and they never went back to retest the fish, nor provided the document to the Cohen Commission despite specific orders to provide exactly this kind of information. One has to ask if this was done to protect the salmon feedlot industry from trade disruption.

Share

Clean Tech Trade Wars: US, European Union vs. China and how FIPPA Hamstrings Canada

Energy and Resources, International, Politics, Renewables
Share

The following is an excerpt from Will Dubitsky’s 3-part blog on FIPPA.

Canada is shooting itself in the foot with the China-Canada trade agreement – the Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Act (FIPPA). Specifically, a little known stipulation in the China-Canada trade agreement risks torpedoing the development of Canadian clean energy technology sectors. This stipulation calls for no commercial barriers on environmental technologies. Why is this dangerous?

Well, with Canada’s clean tech sectors still very much in an embryonic stage, FIPPA, as it presently stands, would impose severe limitations on Canada’s potential participation in the phenomenal growth of global clean technology sectors, because of the massive and highly subsidized dumping of Chinese clean technologies on global markets.

More precisely, while the 1) US response to this dumping has been to impose trade tariffs, running from 31% to 250% on solar tech imports from China, along with tariffs of 45% to 71% on imports of Chinese wind turbine towers; and 2) the European Commission in June 2013 announced provisional tariffs on imports of Chinese solar products, ranging from 37.3% to 58.7%. Canada is the only country dumb enough to accept, via FIPPA, a guaranteed exemption for environmental technologies from commercial barriers.

In the US, the action taken by the US Dept. of Commerce in Fall 2012 followed 1) the bankruptcies of 4 US solar firms; 2) complaints filed by The Coalition for American Solar Manufacturing (CASM), representing 11,000 US workers and 150 US companies; and 3) complaints filed by the US Wind Tower Trade Coalition, representing 4 US wind tower manufacturers.

With 119,000 jobs in the US solar sector in 2012 – a 13.2% increase over 2011 – and 75,000 in the US wind sector in 2011, the US wanted to take swift action to address unfair trade practices affecting sectors experiencing solid growth in these difficult economic times.

In Europe, the European Commission (EC) took action on complaints from EU ProSun, a group representing 20 EU solar companies and the majority of European solar industrial capacity. In May 2013, the EC issued a “warning shot” by indicating it might open fair trade probes into Chinese mobile telecom equipment and in June 2013 the EC announced provisional tariffs on solar imports from China, stating that the dumping by China’s solar firms “caused thousands of Europeans to lose their jobs, and 60 European factory closures of which 30 were in Germany alone”.

For Europe, the job stakes are especially high in that its clean tech sectors represented 1.1 million jobs in 2011 – with 372,000 jobs in Germany alone. In effect, “illegal dumping” below the cost of production allowed China to capture more than 80% of the EU solar energy market “from virtually zero” only a few years ago.

Accordingly, beginning on June 6, 2013, the EC tariffs came into effect at a reduced rate of 11.8% for 2 months with the game plan being that, in the event of failed negotiations with China, the full provisional rate would be ramped up to an average of 47.6%, with the high end at 67.9% for the next 4 months. Subsequently, the EC would decide as to whether it would make the tariffs permanent.

In parallel, BSW, Germany’s solar trade association, is reviewing a trade case against China.

Notwithstanding Europe’s sabre rattling, it appears that the majority of European nations, Germany in particular, would prefer a negotiated settlement over trade wars.

China, for its part, initiated its counter-offensive, in July 2012, when it launched WTO anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigations into allegedly unfair, low-priced US and South Korean polysilicon exports to China. Polysilicon is a key raw material for solar panels and 44% of the polysilicon used by Chinese solar manufacturers comes from the US.

Moreover, China registered a complaint with the WTO to the effect that $7.3B worth of Chinese renewable energy products have been subject to US tariffs in recent years, contrary to WTO rules. China also launched its own probe into subsidies of 4 US states and found they violate WTO rules.

The irony in all this is that, largely due to US polysilicon exports to China, the US had a $1.6B clean tech trade surplus with China in 2011. Specifically, when polysilicon, PV production machines and solar materials are factored in, the US held a $913M solar trade surplus over China in 2011.

Regarding China’s response to the EC’s June 2013 tariff initiatives, China’s polysilicon producers have called on Beijing to launch an anti-dumping investigation into European polysilicon imports, and urged Beijing to retaliate.

To add some colour to China’s sabre rattling, it has also indicated it would investigate the dumping of European wines in China. China did, however, acknowledge that Europe provided for a 2 month period of reduced tariffs.

Over the long run, however, Chinese manufacturers will likely to have an advantage in trade wars because of generous, cheap financing, lower production costs, scales of production which lower total costs, and an ability to refine silicon, make wafers and cells and build modules, as well as, or better than, any other group of manufacturers.

Share

National Research Council’s New Business Focus Ignores How Science Works

Politics
Share

The federal government recently announced a reorganization of the National Research Council to make it more “business-led” and industry-focused. It appears we’re coming full circle to the early 1970s, when Sen. Maurice Lamontagne released “A Science Policy for Canada,” a report proposing Canadian science be directed to “mission-oriented” work rather than “curiosity driven” research.

Since then, many politicians have encouraged support for science that serves market interests. I believe we should support science because curiosity and the ability to ask and answer questions are part of what makes our species unique and helps us find our way in the world. Still, basic research aimed at specific outcomes can lead to game-changing applications, from transistors and pesticides to nuclear bombs, penicillin and oral contraceptives. But how do new applications flow from science?

Many scientists support a mythical notion of what makes science innovative. To be “relevant”, they write grant applications as if their work will lead to cures for cancer, new energy forms or salt-tolerant plants, depending on the priorities of funders and governments. This creates the illusion that science proceeds from experiment A to B to C to solution. But we really have no idea what results an experiment will produce. If we did, there would be no point to the experiment.

It’s more likely that a scientist will do experiment A leading to F then O, while another in a different area will do experiment Z leading to W then L. Maybe the two will meet at a conference or even a pub and, in talking about their respective work, realize that results O and L could lead to a new invention!

In 1958, during my genetics studies, we were assigned to critique papers by corn geneticist Barbara McClintock. She painstakingly crossed corn plants, harvesting two crops, first in Indiana then in Mexico. She discovered an amazing and mystifying phenomenon: “jumping” genes that moved from one chromosome location to another, suppressing gene activity wherever they landed. It defied everything we had learned. I sweated blood to make sense of her elegant experiments, although we assumed the phenomena she studied were peculiar to corn.

Decades later, scientists discovered jumping genes in other organisms, including fruit flies, and found they were useful for studying their development. McClintock was belatedly lionized for her discoveries and ultimately awarded a Nobel Prize in 1983. If her research proposals had been assessed for relevance or potential applications, she wouldn’t have received funding for her early, trailblazing work.

As a graduate student, I also studied the experiments of microbial geneticists Werner Arber and Daniel Nathans, and biochemist Hamilton Smith, who were investigating an esoteric phenomenon: bacteria that resisted infection by viruses called bacteriophages (meaning “eaters of bacteria”). Like McClintock’s work, their experiments were elegant, especially when you consider they were working with microorganisms you can’t see the way you can observe a corn plant or fruit fly.

It was astonishing. The bacteria produced enzymes that cut DNA into pieces. They were called “restriction enzymes” and acted by recognizing specific sequences within the DNA and cutting at that point. Various bacterial species evolved distinct restriction enzymes, cutting DNA at different sequences. When the original experiments were carried out, no one could have anticipated that these enzymes would turn out to be critical tools for genetic engineering. It was just good science. And, like McClintock, the scientists were awarded a Nobel Prize for their work.

Canada’s contribution to science is minuscule compared to countries like the U.S., Britain, Germany and even China. But if our top scientists are as good as any, they become our eyes and ears to cutting-edge science around the world, are invited to speak at top universities and institutes and attend meetings where the latest ideas and discoveries are shared.

If we’re serious about creating partnerships between science and business, we have to support the best scientists so they are competitive with any around the world. We also have to recognize that innovation and discoveries don’t always come from market-driven research. We should recognize truly internationally groundbreaking work to inspire young people who will grow up knowing they can be as good as scientists anywhere. This takes commitment from governments, more generous grants and long-term support.

Share

First Nations Slam Harper Government’s Legal Argument for Canada-China Trade Deal

First Nations, International, Politics
Share

The following statement was issued by the Union of BC Indian Chiefs in response to the Harper Government’s rebuttal to a case being brought by the Hupacasath First Nation against the proposed Canada-China Trade Deal.

Last week the Federal Court of Canada heard oral arguments from the Hupacasath First Nation and the Harper Government on Hupacasath’s legal action regarding the Canada-China Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement (FIPPA). In response to First Nations concerns of infringement on their inherent Aboriginal Title and Rights and lack of consultation the Hupacasath First Nation was compelled to launch a court challenge under Section 35 of the Canadian Constitution.

The Government of Canada argued that there must be causal link between the ratification of FIPPA and the adverse effects on Hupacasath First Nation Title and Rights to proceed with consultation.  Furthermore, the Harper Government held that no Aboriginal group had requested consultation with respect to any of the Canada’s 24 FIPPAs with other countries or that negotiations with respect to Canada-China FIPPA had been available to the general public via the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade website since 2008.

“It is well-documented that FIPA was negotiated in secret and First Nations and Canadians first heard about this agreement when it was signed in 2012.  This agreement is significantly different then the other 24 FIPPA’s Canada references.  China already has and will continue to grow its investments, assets and projects in Canada and consequently we take all the risk in this agreement.  It will allow foreign investment to trump the Title and Rights of First Nations and take full advantage of Canada’s much weakened environmental standards,” said Chief Bob Chamberlin, Vice-President of Union of BC Indian Chiefs.

“It is unbelievable that Canada has argued that consultation requires a ‘request’ from a First Nation.  The Constitution and common law require the Harper Government to meaningfully consult and accommodate our interests where a decision has the potential to infringe our inherent Title and Rights as guaranteed by section 35 of Constitution Act, 1982.   Consultation does not require a ‘request,’ written or otherwise to trigger the Harper Government’s fiduciary duty to consult First Nations,” Councilor Marilyn Baptiste, Secretary-Treasurer of the Union of BC Indian Chiefs stated, “Canada endorsed the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in 2010 which states that ‘Canada shall consult and cooperate in good faith with indigenous peoples in order to obtain their free, prior and informed consent before adopting and implementing legislative or administrative measures that may affect them”, clearly Canada has failed to do so in this matter.”

Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, President of the Union of BC Indian Chiefs concluded, “First Nations and Canadians are extremely concerned with FIPPA and its wide implications including infringements on our inherent Title and Rights and the ability to allow foreign corporate interests to take advantage of the weakened environmental protections to proceed with the rapid expansion of resource development on un-ceded First Nation territories.  Through this agreement, China will be granted protection and would thus greatly increase their investment in the development of the Alberta tarsands, pipelines, mining projects and other resource development projects, all at great risk to our Aboriginal Title, Rights and Treaty rights, but ultimately at great cost to the environment that all British Columbians and Canadians share and treasure.  We will fight to defend this valued legacy that represents the ultimate birthright of our children and grandchildren.”

Share

Canada’s Energy Strategy: Not Just a Federal-Provincial Issue

Energy and Resources
Share
Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson talks green business initiatives during a trade mission to China.
Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson talks green business initiatives during a trade mission to China.

Last month, three Canadian premiers provided a public update on interprovincial efforts to develop a national energy strategy. While their update on the Council of the Federation’s plans opened a needed window on the negotiations, missing from public discussions so far is any reference to the stakes – and potential roles – for municipalities in a Canadian energy strategy.

There are strong arguments for municipalities becoming a bigger part of this process. Rising public sector energy costs and community energy security questions – as well as local economic and environmental concerns related to energy use, production and transportation – mean that municipalities have important interests in Canadian energy policy.

Energy security is an area of growing concern for Canadian communities. Dependence on imported oil leaves public sector organizations, businesses and residents susceptible to fluctuating prices and concerns about supply security. And energy poverty — when households spend over 10 per cent of income on energy costs — is a direct problem for a growing number of Canadians.

Globally, many countries are already transitioning to more sustainable, locally-based and ultimately more secure national energy systems. Municipalities are key players in many of these transitions.  Municipal renewable and district energy projects are an important component of  Germany’s transition towards an 80 percent renewable-based energy system by 2050. In Denmark, municipalities have played an important role that country’s nationwide renewable energy and energy efficiency success.

Energy use is deeply intertwined with climate change.  The same month the Premiers were talking about their work on a national energy strategy,  the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii reported that the concentration of carbon dioxide  in the atmosphere has reached 400 parts per million.  This is 50 parts per million above the safe upper limit for CO2 cited by many scientists, including former NASA head scientist James Hansen.

In 2011 alone, extreme weather events cost Canadians $1.6 Billion, and the bill is projected to get much worse in years to come.  By 2020, the National Roundtable on the Environment and the Economy estimates the annual economic impact of climate change will be $5 billion and more than $40 billion by 2050. Many of these costs will be borne by local governments.

But it’s not all doom and gloom; a national energy strategy opens the door to new economic opportunities for Canadian communities, as well as opportunities to address imbalances in the relationships between municipalities and other orders of government.

Alternative, renew able and low-carbon energy production is rapidly growing. This is a global transformation, and without concerted action, Canada risks being left behind. Jobs and economic activity in the clean energy sector are increasing, and a comprehensive national energy strategy could help municipalities capitalize on these new opportunities.

An overarching strategy to encourage cooperation toward common goals, such as climate change mitigation, energy security, environmental sustainability and a more diversified economy will benefit all Canadians.  It will be stronger if Canada’s municipal governments, which have such important stakes and expertise to contribute, are part of the process.

Charley Beresford is executive director of the Columbia Institute.  “A Canadian Energy Strategy: Why should local government care?” can be downloaded at www.civicgovernance.ca/canadian-energy-strategy

Share

What Happened in British Columbia?

Politics, Western Canada
Share
Adrian Dix expresses disappointment at losing the 2013 B.C. election (Darryl Dyck / The Canadian Press).
Adrian Dix expresses disappointment at losing the 2013 B.C. election (Darryl Dyck / The Canadian Press).

The election has been over now for three weeks, and the media has been full of articles dissecting what happened in an attempt to explain what to many came as a shocking surprise.

It is easy to see what happened, if not why, but generally left unsaid is what probably will not happen with the Liberals getting another four years in government.

A friend of mine made note of that right after the results were in, and I think that it puts the whole event in a more accurate perspective than merely discussing how the election was either won or lost, depending on one’s point of view.

As my friend Marco wrote, for the next four years, there will be:

NO public inquiry into the BC Rail and BC Hydro scandals

NO comprehensive public Environmental-Economic Impact Assessment for major resource development projects (pipelines, mines, fracking, etc.)

NO restoration and repair to our damaged public health, emergency and education systems

NO restoration of curtailed Human Rights, Labour Code and Employment Standards, and Freedom of Information laws

NO serious effort to develop a more sustainable, democratic, local community-based economy and job creation (including co-ops, getting away more from oil dependency, etc.)

NO restoration of a fairer dynamic tax code based on the ability to pay, not on who you know or how well you can blackmail.

NO relief from skyrocketing personal debt, lack of retirement security, lack of access to skills training, declining air and water quality, ever worsening poverty and homelessness and chronic high unemployment

NO electoral or election finance reform or efforts to make government bureaucracy and crown agencies more accountable to the public, including the productive union workers who give them reason to exist.

So, how did this happen?  Polling before the election indicated that the public was fed up with the government, and that they would be defeated soundly.  It did not happen, and the reason that most did not see it coming as it did could be because the polls were asking the wrong questions and the election planners were running with misleading data.

There is no guarantee, however, that even if the right questions were asked and the data was different the opposition would have been able to unseat the government.  It may be that the organization as presently constituted cannot win elections because they are adverse to running the kind of campaign necessary to achieve victory.

The polls are probably telling us what people are thinking, but not so much how they will vote, or more precisely if they will turn their feelings into votes.  The fact is that from the middle of their first term onward the public was generally unhappy with the government.  The opposition lost three elections in a row that were theirs’ to win because they could not turn that dissatisfaction into votes.

For the last thirty years the province has seen a steady decrease in the percentage of eligible voters actually casting a ballot, with the exception of a minor increase in 2005.  The 2013 election had a turnout of just over fifty-two percent of registered voters, but not all eligible voters even bother to register.  The turnout of all eligible voters was just over forty-nine percent.

The government won re-election with just under twenty-two percent of the vote of those estimated to be eligible to vote.  The message here being that most voters, though unhappy with the government, also do not trust the opposition nor the system, and don’t bother to participate.

The root of current dissatisfaction might lay in the results of the 2001 election where after five years of concentrated negative attacks on the NDP government the current government won a landslide victory.  Unfortunately for them their campaign was more hype than reality, and instead of governing with the interests of the province in mind they proceeded to rip up social contracts and sell off public assets. They dropped in the polls.

The reason the opposition has been unable to capitalize on this situation may have roots in their 2000 leadership contest where the populist wing of the party was crushed in this rather unsavory event by party power brokers.  They lost the 2001 election which was no surprise, but losing it by the margin that they did was.

They continued in control of the party, managing to lose two elections with Carole James, and lost more credibility with the ham-handed way that they managed the uprising against Carole dating from at least the 2009 convention.  Now they have lost an election that was more than theirs’ to win, primarily because a majority of the people who do vote do not trust them, and much of the majority who do not vote, won’t because they do not have a good incentive to go to the polls.

What will happen in 2017, or possibly before, will depend upon whether the government can clean up its act and regain popular support (in the thirty polls taken by Angus Reid between August 2009 and May 2013 the government only led or was tied in three of them), and whether the opposition can clean house and energize the public to see them as a credible alternative.

Jerry West publishes The Record in Gold River, BC.

Share

Ontario’s wildlife needs continued protection

Species At Risk
Share

In the early 1970s, a significant shift occurred in the relationship between North Americans and the world we live in. People started to recognize that nature’s bounty isn’t bottomless and that human activities often strain the Earth’s limits. Across Canada and the U.S., faced with society’s perpetual penchant for economic growth as an end unto itself, many people started to advocate for protecting nature lest it be irreparably broken by our actions.

A 1970 Vancouver benefit concert against nuclear testing in Amchitka, Alaska, launched Greenpeace. Earth Day also started that year. The famous picture taken from space by Apollo 17 astronauts, revealing the Earth to be a finite and vulnerable “blue marble”, was shared with the world in 1972.

In 1973, the U.S. recognized that resource extraction, development and land conversion were destroying wildlife homes and ranges to the point that their continued existence was at risk. It passed the Endangered Species Act, to protect plants and animals from extinction as a “consequence of economic growth and development untempered by adequate concern and conservation.”

Canada’s Species at Risk Act wasn’t passed until 2002. But Ontario, in keeping with the trend of the times, introduced legislation in 1971, and then revised it, passing an improved Endangered Species Act in 2007, which scientists and conservationists now consider the gold standard of wildlife protection law in Canada and beyond. Unlike the U.S., much of our country is crown land, managed by provincial governments on behalf of citizens. In other words, government stewards nature on our behalf.

The primary mandate of these acts is to protect the areas species need to survive. In Canada, habitat loss and degradation are the primary causes of decline for more than 80 per cent of listed species.

Sadly, we seem to be entering a new phase: environmental deregulation. Now, when habitat needs to be protected to ensure the survival of a species, government and industry often balk and backpedal. This signals a failure to understand that we depend on nature for our well-being and survival. The web of living things cleanses, replenishes and creates air, water, soil and photosynthetic energy. Species in danger of extinction inform us that our activity is undermining the very life support systems of the planet.

Witness the sage grouse in Alberta: almost 90 per cent of its Canadian population died off between 1988 and 2006 because of habitat destruction caused mainly by oil and gas development. But the Alberta government refuses to curb economic growth and protect the areas it needs to survive and recover. Witness the changes the federal government made last year to the Fisheries Act, controversially weakening the law so only a few select categories of fish will receive legal protection from industrial development. And now, Ontario is poised to weaken its Endangered Species Act by creating a range of exemptions so industry will not have to follow its habitat-protection requirements.

A recently released scientific study proves that endangered species legislation really works. According to the U.S. Center for Biological Diversity’s report, scientists estimate that, were it not for the Endangered Species Act, at least 227 species would likely have gone extinct. The report notes the act wasn’t merely saving plants and creatures from extinction; it also facilitated recovery for more than 100 at-risk species, including the American crocodile, whooping crane and black-footed ferret.

Despite the evidence that endangered species laws are effective, governments in Canada are proceeding with deregulation and abdicating their responsibilities for wildlife habitat protection, often quietly. After all, only a few environmental watchdogs such as the David Suzuki Foundation are looking out for creatures that otherwise have no voice.

But our governments underestimate the public. The federal government likely wagered few would pay much attention when it stripped protections from the Fisheries Act and Environmental Assessment Act. But concerned citizens not only noticed, they protested loudly across the country.

Now, we have an opportunity to be heard before a change is made, as the government of Ontario has not yet passed its proposed exemptions to the Endangered Species Act. Politicians need to know that people care about at-risk plant and wildlife populations. You can make a difference by calling cabinet ministers or MPPs to let them know you oppose the deregulation trend. Visit www.protectendangeredspecies.ca to learn more.

Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation Ontario Science Projects Manager Rachel Plotkin.

Learn more at www.davidsuzuki.org.

Share

Harper’s War on Science

Canada, Climate Change, Climate Science, Politics
Share

The story, by Joyce Nelson, is re-published from Watershed Sentinel.

If Canadians knew the full extent of the Harper government’s  war on science, they would be clamouring for the reinstatement and full funding of dozens of federal scientific programs and hundreds of scientists axed over the past year. Since the passage of omnibus budget Bill C-38, the Harper Cabinet has moved at blitzkrieg speed to make these cuts.

Canada’s Information Commissioner, Suzanne Legault, agreed at the end of March to launch an investigation into the extensive muzzling of federally-funded scientists at the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO), Environment Canada, Natural Resources Canada and other federal agencies (1). Her decision comes after a February 20th complaint formally filed by Democracy Watch in partnership with the Environmental Law Clinic of the University of Victoria, which called for a full investigation and was accompanied by a 128-page report, Muzzling Civil Servants: A Threat to Democracy. That report documents systematic silencing since 2007 of federal scientists involved in research on climate change, the Alberta tar sands, fish farms, and other areas (2).

But the muzzling of scientists is only one aspect of Harper’s war on science. Far more troubling is the actual elimination of scientific programs and the firing of scientists. Jim Turk, director of the Canadian Association of University Teachers, puts it well: “The Harper government wants politics to always trump science. It wants its political views to dominate even if science shows that it’s wrong.”

The NDP’s Megan Leslie is even more caustic: “This government has abandoned evidence-based policy-making to pursue its own brand of policy-based evidence-making.”

The New Inquisition

According to information provided to me in March by the Professional Institute of Public Service Canada (PIPSC) – the union which represents federal scientists and other professionals employed by 38 federal government departments – 5,332 of their members have already either lost their jobs or been transferred to other duties. That number includes 139 scientists/professionals at Environment Canada (cut by $53.8 million), and 436 scientists/professionals at Fisheries and Oceans (already cut by $79.3 million, with $100 million more in cuts announced in the latest March 2013 budget). Thousands of unionized support staff have also been cut from these, and other, departments.

Harper claims that his drastic cuts to most federal agencies are necessary in order to eliminate the deficit before the next federal election. But as business writer David Olive recently observed, “Harper’s ultra-low corporate tax [15%] deprives Ottawa of $13.7 billion a year according to Finance’s own estimates. That’s enough to wipe out the deficit in two years without cutting a single program.”

Canada now has the lowest corporate tax rate of G8 member nations. Indeed, according to a 2013 study by the World Bank and the International Finance Corporation, of 185 countries examined, only seven countries have a lower corporate tax rate than Canada.

The DFO has been especially hard hit by Harper’s  war on science, with three rounds of cuts and another three to come. The entire ocean contaminants research program has been axed, including laboratories and research stations across Canada. World-renowned scientists have been fired, including Dr. Peter Ross, an expert on contaminants’ effects on marine mammals.

Working out of DFO Institute of Ocean Sciences in Sidney, BC for the past 13 years, Dr. Ross is known for his path-breaking research on dioxins in pulp mill effluent, the effects of flame retardants on beluga whales, the impacts of pesticides on wild salmon, and the effects of industrial contaminants on orca whales.

Dr. Ross told Desmog Canada, “If someone is saying that we have to cut 5 per cebt from every department, that’s one thing. But when you turn around and cut 100 per cent of a program, to me that indicates something more than fiscal restraint. It argues in favour of a targeted reduction of a program for some other reason.”

More than a dozen scientific programs important to Canada’s environment and oceans health have been targeted and dismantled over the past year, while others have been slashed to the bone (2).

The Terrible Toll

DFO’s Habitat Management Program – which monitored the effects of harmful industrial, agricultural and land-development activities on wild fish – is gone. DFO’s teams of experts on ocean contaminants in marine mammals, on marine oil pollution, and on oil spill countermeasures have all been disbanded. Gone too is the Centre for Offshore Oil, Gas and Energy Research – the only agency with the ability to adequately assess offshore projects. Nine out of 11 DFO marine science libraries will be shut. And the Experimental Lakes Area is closed.

At Environment Canada, the Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory (PEARL) in Nunavut, involved in monitoring the Arctic ozone hole discovered in 2011, has been closed. Similarly, the Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences, Canada’s main research foundation on climate change, has been axed. The Canadian Centre for Inland Waters – the most important science monitoring agency for the imperilled Great Lakes – has lost key staff members. Cuts to the Action Plan on Clean Water, which funds water remediation, makes communities more vulnerable to toxics.

Harper’s war on science has also eliminated the Hazardous Materials Information Review Commission, the independent agency that ensured fracking companies complied with regulations. And by dismantling the Smokestacks Emissions Monitoring Team at Environment Canada, the government has eliminated “the only Canadian group capable of writing and supervising credible testing methods for new and existing rules to impose limits on pollution from smokestacks”.

In other cuts that are environment-related, the Cereal Research Centre in Winnipeg – which developed popular spring wheat varieties for Western Canada – is set to close in April 2014. Even the National Research Council’s world-renowned Canada Institute for Scientific & Technical Information (CISTI) has been cut drastically. These are the people who solve issues such as responding to pandemics, and maintaining food and product safety. Gary Goodyear, Minister of State for Science and Technology, has consistently defended the Harper government from accusations of a  war on science by emphasizing the $5.5 billion that the Feds have provided to the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI), including another $225 million to the CFI in Economic Action Plan 2013 released on March 21.

The Canada Foundation for Innovation

The CFI – the key decision-maker for all science funding in Canada – has a governing body of 13 members, seven of whom are appointed by the Minister of Industry (Christian Paradis). These members then select the other six members.

This governing body then appoints seven of the 13 CFI Board of Directors, receives reports from the Board, appoints auditors, approves the Annual Report, sets strategic objectives and makes final decisions about what science projects will be funded, including at universities. According to the CFI website, the Members are “similar to a company’s shareholders, but representing the Canadian public.”

But a look at the CFI Members indicates that it is a highly politicized body (including a founding trustee of the Fraser Institute) that is making the decisions about what science to support with its $5.5 billion in taxpayer dollars.

For example, CFI Co-Chair David Fung is so thoroughly embedded in China-Canada business/trade collaboration that he may as well be seen as a de facto vice-president of CNOOC (China National Offshore Oil Corp.).

The other Co-Chair, Roland Hosein, is a vice-president of GE Canada, a company that is thoroughly engaged in promoting “energy export corridors” and water-privatization efforts across Canada, including the Global Energy Network Institute (GENI) and (with Goldman Sachs) the Aqueduct Alliance.

Meanwhile, the Board of Directors of the CFI includes the president/CEO of the Montreal Economic Institute (a perennial advocate of bulk water export), and an executive for Husky Energy (whose Hong Kong billionaire owner Li Ka-Shing is buying up water/utilities around the globe).

Otherwise, both the CFI Members List and the CFI Board are packed with corporate biotechnology representatives.

So Harper’s war on science has some obvious goals, including getting rid of all federally-funded science that would impede water export, as well as any science standing in the way of aquaculture, tar sands and natural gas export.

As Maude Barlow and renowned freshwater scientist David Schindler wrote in The Star Phoenix, “The Harper government is systematically dismantling almost every law, regulation, program or research facility aimed at protecting freshwater in Canada and around the world.” Harper even killed the Global Environmental Monitoring System, an inexpensive project that monitored 3,000 freshwater sites around the world for a UN database.

The “One-for-One” Rule

In 2010, the Harper government created the Red Tape Reduction Commission, a little-known advisory body overseen by Treasury Board’s Tony Clement and packed with private-sector members. They came up with a strategy for “reducing the regulatory burden on businesses to better enable them to make needed investments in productivity and job creation.” Called the “one-for-one” rule, the measure “requires regulators to remove a regulation each time they introduce a new regulation that imposes new administrative burden on business.” The Harper government adopted the “one-for-one” rule in January 2013, with Treasury Board bragging that “Canada will be the first country to give such a rule the weight of legislation.”

Of course, the Harper government has already wiped out most federal environmental regulation with omnibus budget bills C-38 and C-45. And now, with the  war on science, a few beancounters left in federal departments will be tasked with choosing which rule to eliminate if a new regulation is added.

That kind of stupidity is what has made the Harper Conservatives (and Canada) look truly medieval to much of the scientific world.

Now the Harper government is scrambling to look “green” and “scientific” in order to get U.S. approval for its Keystone XL dilbit export pipeline and to bolster various trade issues (including the Fuel Quality Directive) pending with Europe. But having axed so much environmental and climate science, including the Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences, and having fired hundreds of scientists across the land, the Harper Cabinet looks like nothing less than the New Inquisition dressed in a cowboy hat.

Joyce Nelson is an award-winning freelance writer/researcher and the author of five books.

 

(1) Information Commissioner To Investigate Muzzling of Federal Scientists

At the end of March 2013, Canada’s federal Information Commissioner, Suzanne Legault, agreed to launch an investigation into the muzzling of federally-funded scientists at the departments of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO), Environment Canada (EC), Natural Resources Canada (NRCan) and other federal agencies.

Sporadic mainstream media reports since 2008 have attempted to highlight the muzzling of Canada’s scientists, who have been prevented from giving interviews with journalists and speaking freely about their taxpayer-funded research. In February 2012 BBC News reported the findings of Canadian journalist Margaret Munro: “The Postmedia News journalist obtained documents relating to interview requests using Canada’s equivalent of the Freedom of Information Act. She said the documents show interview requests move up what she describes as an ‘increasingly thick layer of media managers, media strategists, deputy ministers, then go up to the Privy Council Office, which decides yes or no’.”

The Privy Council Office (PCO) supports and takes its orders from the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO), but it has a certain degree of power in its own right. The Clerk of the Privy Council is Wayne G. Wouters. The President of the Privy Council is Denis Lebel (Minister of Transport, Infrastructure & Communities; Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs; and Minister of the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Region of Quebec). There are four other Harper Cabinet Ministers in the PCO: Marjory LeBreton (Leader of the Government in the Senate); Peter Van Loan (Leader of the Government in the House of Commons); Gordon O’Connor (Minister of State and Chief Government Whip); and Tim Uppal (Minister of State for Democratic Reform).

Just how thoroughly Suzanne Legault will investigate this chain of command in terms of the muzzling remains to be seen.

(2) Environmental Science Axed by the Harper government (2012-2013)

Department of Fisheries & Oceans

Programs discontinued:

• Species-at-Risk Program

• Ocean Contaminants & Marine Toxicology Program

• Habitat Management

• Experimental Lakes Area (Northern Ontario) *St. Andrews Biological Station (New Brunswick)

• Centre for Offshore Oil & Gas Energy Research

• Kitsilano Coast Guard Station

Budget slashed:

• Institute of Ocean Sciences (Sidney, B.C.)

• Freshwater Institute – Winnipeg

• Oil Spill Counter-Measures Team

• Canada Coast Guard

• Maurice-Lamontagne Institute (Quebec)

• Marine Science Libraries

Environment Canada

Programs discontinued:

• Environmental Emergency Response Program

• Urban Wastewater Program

• Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory (Nunavut)

• Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences

• Smokestacks Emissions Monitoring Team

• Hazardous Materials Information Review Commission

• National Roundtable on the Environment and the Economy

Budget slashed:

• Environmental Protection Operations

• Compliance Promotion Program

• Action Plan on Clean Water

• Sustainable Water Management Division

• Environmental Effects Monitoring Program

• Contaminated Sites Action Plan

• Chemicals Management Plan

• Canadian Centre for Inland Waters (Burlington, Ont.)

Natural Resources Canada (NRC)

Budget slashed:

• Reduced science capacity for oversight and research

National Research Council

Budget slashed:

• Canada Institute for Scientific & Technical Information

Transport Canada

Budget slashed:

• Transportation of Dangerous Goods (pipeline and tankers oversight)

• Transport Canada Aircraft Services

Other

Programs discontinued:

• Arctic Institute of North America’s Kluane Research Station

• The Global Environmental Monitoring System

• Cereal Research Centre (Winnipeg)

• Canadian Environmental Network

• Prairies Regional Office: Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency

• The Research Tools and Instruments Grant Program

• Grants Programs administered by Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC)

Budget slashed:

• The Centre for Plant Health (Vancouver Island)

• Canadian Science Centre for Human and Animal Health (Winnipeg)

• Horticulture Research & Development Centre (Quebec)

• Plant Pathology Program (Summerland, B.C.

• The Great Lakes Forestry Centre (Toronto)

• The National Water Research Institute (Burlington, Ont.)

• Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Administration

Share

Bean Leaves, Bedbugs and Biomimicry

Uncategorized
Share

Scientists often come up with new discoveries, technologies or theories. But sometimes they rediscover what our ancestors already knew. A couple of recent findings show we have a lot to learn from our forebears – and nature – about bugs.

Modern methods of controlling pests have consisted mainly of poisoning them with chemicals. But that’s led to problems. Pesticides kill far more than the bugs they target, and pollute air, water and soil. As we learned with the widespread use of DDT to control agricultural pests and mosquitoes, chemicals can bioaccumulate, meaning molecules may concentrate hundreds of thousands of times up the food web – eventually reaching people.

As Rachel Carson wrote in her 1962 book Silent Spring, using DDT widely without knowing the full consequences was folly. She showed it was polluting water and killing wildlife, especially birds, and that it could cause cancer in humans. Her book launched the environmental movement but did little to change our overall strategy for dealing with bugs. Although DDT was banned worldwide for agricultural purposes in 2001, the chemical is still used to control insects that spread disease.

Recent research shows that widespread use of pesticides like DDT may have caused us to ignore or forget benign methods of pest control. Because the chemicals were so effective, infestations were reduced and there was little interest in non-toxic methods. But bugs evolve quickly and can become immune to pesticides. That’s true of bedbugs, the now ubiquitous critters that are showing up around the world in homes, hotels, schools, movie theatres – even libraries.

But a method used long ago provides an effective and non-toxic weapon against the pests, according to a U.S. study in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface. The authors looked into the once-common Eastern European practice of spreading bean leaves around a bed to control bedbugs. What they found was fascinating.

“During the night, bed bugs walking on the floor would accumulate on these bean leaves, which were collected and burned the following morning to exterminate the bed bugs. The entrapment of bed bugs by the bean leaves was attributed to the action of microscopic plant hairs (trichomes) on the leaf surfaces that would entangle the legs of the bed bugs,” the scientists, from the University of California, Irvine, and University of Kentucky, wrote.

They discovered that after bugs get caught up in the hooked plant hairs, they struggle to escape, and in the process vulnerable parts of their feet are pierced by the hooks, permanently trapping them. The research focuses on a way to replicate this. “This physical entrapment is a source of inspiration in the development of new and sustainable methods to control the burgeoning numbers of bed bugs,” the researchers wrote, adding that the method “would avoid the problem of pesticide resistance that has been documented extensively for this insect.”

Other research has literally dug up pest control methods that go back millennia. An international team of archeologists recently found evidence that people living in South Africa almost 80,000 years ago made bedding out of insect-repelling plants.

According to the journal Science, the research team found 15 different layers containing bedding made from compacted stems and leaves of sedges and rushes, dating between 77,000 and 38,000 years ago. One layer of leaves was identified as River Wild-quince, which contains “chemicals that are insecticidal, and would be suitable for repelling mosquitoes.” The archeologists also found evidence that people often burned the bedding after use, possibly to remove pests.

These are just two examples of what we can learn from our ancestors and from nature. Because natural systems tend toward balance, the fascinating field of biomimicry has developed to explore what nature can teach us. It’s aimed at finding “sustainable solutions by emulating nature’s time-tested patterns and strategies,” according to the Biomimicry Guild website. “The goal is to create products, processes, and policies – new ways of living – that are well-adapted to life on earth over the long haul.”

Maybe the truest sign of human intelligence is not to learn how we can shoehorn nature into our own agenda, but to see how we can better find our own place in nature.

Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation Communications Manager Ian Hanington.

Learn more at www.davidsuzuki.org

Share